Money makin'

21/04/2011

We'll tell you what - they work hard, the folks at Apple, but they're bloody well rewarded for it.

Whether you think their products are magical and revolutionary, or overpriced and under-flexible, millions have invited the shiny silver (and in some cases black) slabs into their computing life. And Apple is doing very nicely indeed as a result.

How nicely? Well, in the first three months of this year they had a revenue - that's total sales - of $24.67 billion. Yep. That's more than the GDP of Latvia, fact fans. It's up one-third from the same quarter last year.

And profits? A faintly absurd $6 billion. That's a ludicrous double the profits for the same quarter last year.

Where's it all coming from? Well, therein lies a story. iPad sales, which drove tremendous growth in 2010, are actually down a bit in the last quarter, compared to late 2010. As Gizmodo points out, this 'isn't totally unexpected, considering the tablet's popularity as a holiday gift, the looming specter of iPad 2 staving off potential sales, and there not being enough of those same iPad 2s to go around. And at 4.69 million units, it's not like the division is shriveling.'

But it's the iPhone that's really going great guns. Thanks to Apple making a deal with the US' Verizon earlier this year, making it available on more than one network stateside for the first time, iPhone sales are up 113%. That's more than double, maths fans. In fact, TechCrunch did the maths and worked out that the iPhone accounts for more than half Apple's total earnings.